Russia's Military Plans and Demographic Reality Part Two Research Paper (original) (raw)

2023

— Emigration and partial mobilisation have had an immediate negative impact on the Russian economy, and in the long term this is likely to grow worse. — Emigration and casualties in Ukraine combine with pre-existing demographic trends to also present a challenge to Russia’s plans to enlarge its military. — However, the precise extent of all these challenges is unlikely to be discernible from open sources due to coverage gaps and unreliable official statistics from Russia. — The impact of current Russian decisions may be highly damaging for Russia itself, up to and including the potential for open unrest in the longer term. — But accurate assessment of the probable impact requires both multi- disciplinary specialist study and access to sources of information that are not currently in the public domain.